


Daybreak

by GoldenTruth813



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: 90's muggle toys, Banter, Boys In Love, Boys Kissing, Coffee Shops, Denial, Falling In Love, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Getting Together, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, Humor, Love Confessions, M/M, Oblivious Draco Malfoy, Pining, Romance, Seekers Games, Snark, Toys, and bad 90's fashion, casual stalking, harry james potter appreciation, so much denial you could fill a river, space bouncys, toymaker Harry Potter, wand holsters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-30
Updated: 2019-04-30
Packaged: 2020-02-08 20:58:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 19,960
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18631096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GoldenTruth813/pseuds/GoldenTruth813
Summary: After Harry Potter mysteriously disappeared at the end of their 8th year, Draco did his best to put thoughts of him in the past and move on with his life. He was doing quite splendidly, content with his routine. That is, until Potter showed up one Tuesday without warning wearing a wand holster and a crooked smile. Shortly after, everything in Draco’s life narrowed down to one unavoidable reality: he was rapidly becoming obsessed with Harry Potter.





	Daybreak

**Author's Note:**

> I cannot thank carpemermaidtales and aibidil enough for their wonderful alpha and beta on this fic. All the comments and help fine tuning this were invaluable and the flailing and cheer reading along with listening to me ramble while writing made this entire fic so much fun to write.

Draco began to lose his mind on a Tuesday.

Rain barrelled down in buckets, threatening to break through his well-cast _Impervius_ as he darted from Quality Quidditch Supplies into Erumpets & Crumpets—the new cafe in Diagon Alley that had opened up a few short months ago. He was cold and hungry and quite frankly a bit grumpy that Mr Flatnor—the new proprietor of the shop—refused to sell Draco the newest Firebolt two weeks early. Not that Draco needed it, since he hadn‘t been flying since he left Hogwarts, but he wanted it nonetheless. Flatnor hadn’t even budged at the promise of a lucrative tip. Draco was used to getting what he wanted and was therefore in a fairly foul mood when he pushed open the door to the cafe, the familiar dinging of the bell giving him a small amount of comfort.

All Draco wanted was a spot of tea—loose leaf earl grey, three sugars, and absolutely no milk— and a warm scone with globs of gooseberry jam and thick clotted cream.

Naturally, he was minding his own business, shaking the residual water droplets off his robes and wondering why it was so busy at half-past two when he spotted him. _Potter_. Draco knew immediately his entire day was ruined. Truthfully, it had already been a downward spiral with the rain and forgetting his lunch at home, but it was easier, and more fun, to blame Potter.

Potter, who was leaning against the counter as if it were completely normal and acceptable for him to be back in the wizarding world and standing inside of Draco’s favorite cafe. Potter, who was standing there laughing with Luna as if it were completely normal for him to suddenly be back in England. Not just back in England, but back in Draco’s life. Sort of. Enough to mess it up, at least.

That would’ve been enough to bother Draco, because of course Potter laughed loudly. It wasn’t as if everyone in the entire place needed to know that Potter found something amusing. He could cover his mouth or fight back his laughter like any other civilised person would. Then again, Potter had never been normal or civilised, so Draco supposed it was ridiculous to assume he’d start now. Honestly.

As if his blatant attention-seeking, faux displays of happiness weren’t bad enough, Potter was wearing Muggle clothing. And not just any Muggle clothing, but look-at-me Muggle clothing consisting of a pair of well-fitting dark brown trousers, a soft looking white t-shirt and a long trench coat. The outfit was simple enough, Draco supposed, though it irked him because he hated people who spent so much time trying to look like they didn’t care about looking good. Clothes didn’t just come off the rack skimming people’s bodies like that—shirt hugging the flat of Potter’s stomach and coat perfectly snug against the breadth of his broad shoulders. Potter’s hair might’ve been as messy as ever, his body language radiating nonchalance, but Draco wasn’t fooled one bit. No one looked that attractive without trying.

Well Potter was in for a rude surprise if he thought he’d get Draco’s attention.

Draco hadn’t seen Potter in a long time. Draco knew exactly how long it had been—one hundred and eighty-nine days since Potter had disappeared, the day after they’d left Hogwarts, without a trace. _The Prophet_ had been full of Potter’s name after, but despite the high-profile articles, there hadn’t been a single photo of him published. It was as if he’d simply vanished off the face of the earth. Of course, if anyone bothered to look at Weasley and Granger going about their lives as normal and looking completely unconcerned by the media attention surrounding Potter’s sudden exit from the wizarding world, then it was easy enough to imagine that wherever he had gone, he was safe. Of course, knowing Potter was safe didn’t stop Draco from wondering where he’d gone or what he was doing. Not that Draco would admit that to anyone. As far as anyone else was concerned, he’d left his obsession with Potter where it belonged: in the past.

If Draco happened to sometimes pull out his school uniform and think about Potter’s ridiculous hair and crooked smile during their eighth year, it didn’t mean anything. Especially since that smile hadn’t been for Draco. And if he just so happened to keep a torn-out page from the Daily Prophet with a photo someone managed to get of Draco and Potter in their final Quidditch match, it was only because Draco had managed to lead Slytherin to victory that day. Not because he could still recall in vivid detail the way Potter’s handshake had lingered longer than necessary or the way it’d felt to have Potter’s sun-warmed fingers pressing against his wrist.

Potter just existed in larger-than-life ways, and somehow seemed to be present in all of Draco’s best and worst memories. Therefore, it wasn’t Draco’s fault that he thought of the other man often, even four years post-Hogwarts. It was Potter’s fault, clearly.

It was also, therefore, Potter’s fault that Draco was so busy staring at him as he walked away with his obscenely large chocolate cupcake and hot beverage, that no fewer than four other people managed to get in the queue before him, resulting in the absolute horror of the last freshly baked scone being placed on a plate for the elderly witch in front of him mere moments before it was Draco’s turn to order. He licked his lips, almost able to taste the agony of his disappointment. He always had a scone on Tuesdays. Always. Merlin, Potter really could fuck everything up.

Draco was fully prepared to ignore Potter when he passed on his way out, the arrangement of his face already mapped in his mind. He’d keep his eyes open, mouth in a thin line of disinterest and his voice aloof as he’d whisper, “Why, Potter, I didn’t even see you.”

His foolproof plan was unsurprisingly ruined by Potter and the fact that the other man was so busy shoving an oversized bite of chocolate cupcake—big enough for a Hippogriff in heat, it was!—into his mouth that he didn’t notice Draco purposely not noticing _him_ and walked out of the cafe without acknowledging Draco’s presence at all.

Draco very nearly had a heart attack then and there, and it was all he could do to force his feet forward in the queue.

“Hello, Draco. How are you today?” Luna asked when it was Draco’s turn to order.

“Abysmal,” he answered, still eyeing the empty spot in the case where the scones should’ve been.

“Oh dear, that does sound rather tragic. Perhaps something to eat will cheer you up. I’m afraid we’re all out of your usual, but we have some delicious chocolate cupcakes you might like. They’re new on the menu today. Would you like to try one?”

Draco bristled at the idea that a chocolate cupcake was an adequate replacement for a scone.

“No, I would not,” he snapped, harsher than was necessary. None of this was Luna’s fault, after all.

She didn’t seem fazed by his tone, reaching over and patting the top of Draco’s hand. “I understand there’s more on your mind than just the scones. I was surprised to see Harry here as well. But he looks good, doesn’t he?”

Draco‘s eyes widened. “I have no idea what you mean.”

“Of course you do, you were staring at him for a good five minutes. You’re such an awful liar, Draco.”

Draco’s lips turned down in a frown. “I most certainly was not staring and I don’t lie,” he lied.

“Whatever you say.” Luna smiled kindly. “What can I get you today, then?”

“My usual tea, extra hot, and I suppose I’ll have to make do with a chocolate cupcake,” he said with the air of someone who had suffered great trauma. Which he had. _Acutely_. He could practically taste the spell-warmed scone and jam. He might need to break his routine and come back here tomorrow instead of waiting another week for his Tuesday treat. For the scone, of course, not to see if Potter would be here again.

“That’s a wonderful choice,” Luna said happily, tucking a stray strand of hair behind her ear before boxing up the cupcake in a small, brightly coloured to-go box, same as she did with his normal order every week. Draco was nothing if not a creature of habit. “I’ll have your drink ready in just a few minutes. Have a lovely day, Draco.”

She passed the box across the counter and an image of Potter (wolfing down his cupcake as he left instead of taking it to go and eating it in private) flashed through Draco’s mind. It had been positively indecent the way Potter’s tongue had darted out to lick the thick globs of chocolate frosting from the corner of his mouth. The absolute heathen.

“Thank you,” Draco replied, straightening his shoulders and hoping his face wasn’t reddening. If it was, that was Potter’s fault, too. He slid his Galleons across the counter, depositing his change into the hand-painted tip jar by the register before moving to the end of the counter to wait for his drink.

Exactly two minutes and fifteen seconds passed before he caved and opened the box, withdrawing the cupcake and taking a small bite. As the decadently sweet treat passed his lips, he definitely did not think about Potter or the way Potter’s face had lit up, as if he were happy.

He didn’t think about Potter as he walked back to his office with half a cupcake shoved in his robe pocket and his tea clutched in his hand, and he definitely didn’t think of Potter when he fell into a restless sleep that night and dreamt of wide-open skies.

 

****

***~*~*~***

“Oh, Draco, what a surprise,” Luna said the moment he walked through the door. “It’s a beautiful day today, isn't it? What brings you in this morning?”

Draco blinked, barely awake and unprepared for Luna to be dressed like the human embodiment of the sun. She was dressed in ornately embroidered yellow robes and on her head was perched a crown of wildflowers with what Draco was seventy-one percent sure was a real bird atop the bee orchids. She flitted between tables filling the tiny sugar bowls with a flick of her wand. Most noticeable, however, was how cheerful she was, considering it wasn’t even seven in the morning yet. He didn’t know anyone who was actually happy to be awake at this time of day.

“The beauty of the day has yet to be determined,” Draco said, shoving his hands into his pockets as his eyes roamed around the cafe. Despite having frequented the establishment weekly for the last few months, he’d never actually been in the morning and was therefore surprised to find that it was rather sparsely populated. There was an elderly wizard tucked into a table in the corner, scribbling away in his journal. And, at the largest table near the door, was what looked suspiciously like an actual hag with a hat made of parchment and a large head of garlic strung around her neck reading tarot cards and working her way through a large pot of tea. 

“We have scones today. Surely that would improve the quality of your morning. I made a batch of the lemon curd you like so much just before we opened, as well. It would pair nicely with a salted caramel rose tea latte.” She swirled her wand and the roses at the table in front of her, which had begun to wilt, perked up, looking as if they were just picked. She smiled at Draco in a knowing way. “There’s very little good food and the right cup of tea can’t fix.”

“I suppose I could be persuaded to try a new drink, but only if I get extra lemon curd.”

Luna’s robes fluttered behind her as she hurried behind the counter. “Will that be for here or to go today?”

Draco paused. She never asked him that. He always took his order to go. Always. He glanced at his watch and pursed his lips. Technically, he did have more than half an hour before he was needed in the office, and there were plenty of open tables. Besides, if he stayed and Potter happened to come in, it would give Draco the upper hand in ensuring he would be the one to ignore Potter.

“For here today.”

Luna’s smile brightened. “Delightful. Choose any seat you like and I’ll bring your order to you in a few minutes.”

Draco nodded in thanks, turning towards the mostly empty cafe and giving it a thorough examination. Most of the time, he was in such a hurry that he spent more time looking at the menu than the seating, which was usually occupied. The place had a different air about it in the early morning hours, a sort of quiet that Draco didn't usually associate with Luna’s hustling and bustling cafe. He weaved his way through the mismatched tables and chairs, taking a seat in one of the oversized floral armchairs near the window.

It was surprisingly peaceful and Draco allowed several long moments of calm before pulling a book from his robe pocket. It didn’t take long before he was completely absorbed in the story, mind wandering with curiosity about how it might end, when his attention was drawn to the sound of Luna’s approaching footsteps. He looked up from his book to see Luna standing beside his chair, an antique serving tray bobbing in the air behind her. She smiled at Draco before sending the tray down onto the small table beside him.

“Do you need anything else?” she asked, apparently unconcerned with the bird burrowing itself into her hair for a nap. 

“No thank you; this looks quite fine.”

Luna nodded, lifting her hand in a half wave before fluttering away. It wasn’t until she was situated behind the counter and humming loudly to herself as she filled the pastry case that Draco turned to his tray and saw a large freshly baked scone and small bowls of lemon curd and clotted cream. Though what really caught his eye was his drink, which was not in his usual paper to-go cup. His tea was in a strange teacup which, upon closer inspection, Draco found was definitely two different teacups that had been spelled together. The saucer was a completely different pattern altogether and it took Draco a moment to realise that, while the teacup seemed to made of simple Muggle china, the saucer was apparently wizarding-made, as no sooner had he leaned over to examine the painted rose bushes did a rabbit hop out from behind one of them and bounce across the plate.

Draco found himself smiling before he’d even lifted the teacup to his mouth. The smile fell when he noticed his tea had actual bits of rose petals floating in it. He wrinkled his nose in distaste but tentatively took a sip nonetheless, surprised to find it unexpectedly delicious.

Perhaps he should try new things more often. He couldn’t recall the last time he’d tried a new tea. Well, aside from the day he’d come into Luna’s cafe and placed his first order. But ordering what he drank at home was hardly revolutionary, even if the probability of it being made wrong and tasting absolutely atrocious had seemed disproportionately high at the time. 

Yes, Draco thought, it was a splendid idea for him to plan more things like this into his days. He definitely needed to schedule more spontaneity in his life. The thought took hold immediately, as new thoughts were wont to for Draco, and in less than two minutes he could already imagine the small ways his life would change now that more scones and this funny tea latte were to be a part of it. He could already see himself making this a new Wednesday morning habit when the bell above the door jingled loudly, startling him out of his brightening mood.

Draco nearly spat his tea across his lap when he saw who it was: _Potter._

He was wearing the same coat as the day before, though it was buttoned up, the material fit snug across his chest today, making it impossible for Draco to get a glimpse of whatever attention-seeking outfit he might have on beneath it. All he could see was the bottom of Potter’s trousers and a pair of plain red trainers beneath it,which looked as ridiculous as his hair, which stuck up in every direction. Unaware of Draco’s staring, Potter shut the door behind him as he straightened his glasses and attempted to pat down his hair.

“Hopeless,” Draco mumbled against the rim of his teacup, watching with undisguised interest as Potter meandered to the counter and began to speak to Luna in a low voice. A frown marred Draco’s features as he realised he couldn’t make out a word they were saying; Luna’s smile brightened as Potter’s face turned down in unmistakable disappointment, and Draco burned with curiosity. Not that he truly cared what had Potter looking so forlorn or why Potter was here so early in the morning, it was simply natural curiosity that sprung from an active mind. Anyone would be curious.

He was halfway through his mental plan of pretending to need something from Luna so he’d have a respectable excuse for making his way to the counter so that he could make sure Potter knew he was ignoring him when someone clearing their throat nearly made him spill his tea.

Without lifting his head, he knew exactly who was standing in front of him—all-too-familiar red trainers peeked out from beneath a black coat. Draco closed his eyes and sighed.

“Nihil, unus, duo, tres, quattuor, quinque,” he chanted.

“Er, what are you doing?” Potter asked.

Draco cracked his eyes open to see Potter had shoved his hands into his pockets, shoulders hunched forward. “I was attempting to count to ten in Latin.”

“Why?” 

“I thought perhaps if I did, you wouldn’t be here when I finished.”

Potter, the complete and utter wanker, smiled. “I see you haven’t changed.”

Draco bristled, setting his tea down and folding his hands in his lap. “Unfortunately, it appears you haven’t either. Do you plan to stand there all morning towering over me like an overgrown bowtruckle or are you going to sit down and pretend you understand how to function in polite society like a normal human being?”

“Normal is overrated,” Potter deadpanned as he unbuttoned his coat revealing a bright red t-shirt and a pair of jeans before draped it over the back of the empty armchair beside Draco before plopping his arse down into it. When Draco had said sit, he hadn’t meant next to him.

It took Draco a good ten seconds of openly gaping to realise Potter was speaking to him but he couldn’t focus on the words coming out of the other man’s mouth because he was too distracted by the thing wrapped around his leg. It appeared to be a holster of sorts, two thick leather straps wound around the thickest part of Potter’s upper thigh. It wasn’t until he shifted, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees that Draco noticed the wand poking out the side of the leather straps. A _wand holster_. What in the bloody hell did Potter have a wand holster for? He tried to imagine why any twenty-year-old man would walk around wearing a wand holster. They certainly hadn’t been in fashion in well over a century and, to Draco’s knowledge, Potter hadn’t shown up at Erumpents and Crumpets to challenge him to a wizard’s duel. At least, he didn't think so. It would’ve required a formal agreement between two gentlemen—of which Potter was most obviously not one—and a handshake to formalise the duel. Draco most certainly hadn’t shaken anyone’s hands recently, especially not Potter’s.

Which meant the holster had to be for another purpose, but for what kind Draco couldn’t begin to imagine. He supposed it was objectively appealing, if one were tantalised by the appearance of strong leather straps and thick buckles wound around equally thick thighs. Which Draco was not, of course. Witches and wizards had so many robe pockets in which to store their wands it made very little sense to keep it strapped to one’s body like that. Unless it was for a reason. Problem was, Draco couldn’t imagine what reason.

Perhaps Potter had secretly joined the Ministry as an Auror or an Unspeakable. That would certainly explain the wand holster and half-a-year disappearance. Or maybe he’d been secretly working with one of the off-the-record departments the Ministry claimed didn’t exist but Draco knew very well did, since he was regularly tasked with sending memos to nonexistent floors and departments.

It wasn’t until Potter waved a hand in front of his face that Draco realised he’d completely drifted. 

“You know, for a minute there I thought maybe you’d been hexed or something,” Potter said, his eyebrows furrowed in what looked suspiciously like actual concern. Draco didn’t know what to do with that observation, so he did what any other highly attractive, smart, and intelligent young man would do in his place—ignored it completely. 

“No need to get into my personal space, Potter. I was merely thinking. You should try it sometime.”

Potter snorted, lip quirking up in the corner. “Merlin, you really haven’t changed at all, have you?”

“You’ve only been gone for six months, Potter. Not six years. What did you expect, me to have grown a second head while you were off riding llamas or whatever the bloody hell it was you were doing?” he grumbled, breaking a corner off his scone and popping it into his mouth in what he desperately hoped would appear to be a nonchalant manner. 

“Llamas?” Potter asked with a raised eyebrow, resting his elbows on his knees and leaning his body forward as if he were comfortable in Draco’s presence. “That seems a bit outlandish, even for you.”

Draco nearly choked on his scone. Potter had absolutely zero sense of decorum. That, or he really had come to challenge Draco to a wizard’s duel and was lulling him into a false sense of security. He didn’t think anything would surprise him anymore.

“Well, no one knows what you were doing, do they?” Draco bristled. “You just disappeared like a dying phoenix, except you didn’t pop back into existence. At least not here. Not that it was a big deal or anything; hardly anyone noticed, of course. It made the paper for a few days, but then people assumed you’d run off to become a hermit because you hated the wizarding world and had moved on.”

“I didn’t hate anyone,” Potter said, his voice unwavering in its conviction. “Well, except for myself, maybe.”

There was a look in his eyes Draco didn’t know what to do with—a haunted look Draco was only used to seeing when he looked in a mirror. 

As if sensing Draco’s scrutiny, Potter shifted, sucking his bottom lip into his mouth and running a hand through his mess of hair. He looked far too much like a crup that someone had locked outside, with his big eyes peering at Draco from beneath his thick frames and his downturned lips. It was absolutely pathetic and Draco didn’t feel one bit sorry for him. The ache in his stomach was definitely not due to Potter’s presence but because the unexpected company had prevented him from eating his breakfast in peace. Draco’s digestive system was very delicate and didn’t handle the presence of human disasters well. 

“Are the scones here good?” Potter asked, looking desperate for something to talk about.

“I couldn’t possibly say what someone of your poor taste finds adequate,” Draco said, his hand reaching out for his plate of its own accord. If he hadn’t seen Potter’s wand strapped to his thigh, he’d swear he’d been Imperiused as his mouth opened and he said, “I suppose you could try mine.”

Potter grinned—his nose wrinkling up and far too many of his teeth showing—as he snaked out a hand to break off a large piece of the scone. 

His hand hovered over the small bowl of lemon curd and Draco rolled his eyes. “You can try that, too.”

Potter dunked the scone into the curd like the absolute heathen he was before popping it into his mouth, another smile spreading across his face as he chewed. 

“S’good,” he said, licking his lips.

“Of course it is,” Draco said, realising he was still holding the plate out. He snatched his hand back and dropped the plate onto the table beside him.

“You always liked them at Hogwarts too,” Potter observed. “Shouldn’t be surprised that's all you get here, too. Luna said they’re your favorite. Creature of habit, huh, Malfoy?”

Draco straightened his back, ignoring the unsettled feeling fluttering in his chest at the idea of being talked about. “Some of us know what we like. It’s nothing to be ashamed of.”

“I didn’t mean—”

“Oh it’s so lovely to see you two getting along,” Luna interrupted, making Draco jump. He hadn’t even heard her approaching. 

“Malfoy here was just extolling the virtues of your baked goods,” Potter said with a cheeky look, as if he and Draco were in on something together. Perhaps Potter was the one who had been Imperiused. 

“Draco is a wonderful patron. My business picked up so much when he had me cater his birthday celebration,” Luna said.

Draco rubbed his sweaty palms across his thighs. “It was nothing.”

“Draco’s too modest. The Prophet did an entire spread about my pastries and cakes after the party. I’d been open for weeks and had nothing close to the kind of business I got after that. It was wonderful. Life really works in funny ways, doesn’t it? Draco is a good friend.”

Draco reached for his tea, feigning interest in its contents and ignoring Potter’s heavy gaze. Draco didn’t care what Potter thought of him. He didnt care what anyone thought of him anymore. He didn’t. Especially not Potter.

“Here’s your order by the way, Harry,” Luna said, holding out a to-go box and a paper cup. “Sorry about the long wait, I had to frost the cupcakes. I wasn’t expecting anyone to buy any so early.”

Potter’s cheeks flushed in embarrassment and Draco nearly snorted. Who in the bloody hell ate chocolate cupcakes for breakfast?

“Thanks so much, Luna. You’re the best.” Potter rose, grabbing his coat and throwing it over his arm before taking his food from Luna and turning towards Draco. “It was uh, good to see you again, Malfoy.”

Draco lifted his gaze to find Potter watching him expectantly.

“You too, Potter. You look well,” he said, only because it was the polite thing to do. If his eyes roamed over Potter’s long legs and thigh holster one last time it was only because of his continued curiosity at who had taught Potter to buy clothing in the right size or why he needed the holster. 

“Guess I’ll see you around,” Potter said, shifting his feet.

“Diagon Alley is quite small. It’s very possible you will. Though I usually only come here on Tuesdays in the afternoon,” he said, pretending to brush a piece of lint from his lap and refusing to look at Potter as he spoke. “I’m very busy you know. I work at the Ministry.”

“Draco works in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement for their communication and branch. He’s very talented.”

“That’s fascinating,” Potter said in the same tone of voice he used to use when he was bullshitting his way through an answer at school.

“There’s nothing wrong with my career, Potter,” Draco snapped.

“I didn’t say there was,” he said, holding up his hands in defence. The fact that they were full of coffee and pastry rather lessened the effect.

“Harry is trying to be nice, Draco,” Luna tried, looking back and forth between them with pursed lips.

“Yes, well, no one asked Potter to be nice to me, did they?”

“You’re such an arsehole,” Potter sighed.

Draco’s eyes widened as he made a face at Luna as if to say _do you see what I’m having to deal with_.

“I think I smell something burning,” Luna, the traitor, said abruptly. Draco didn’t smell a bloody thing. “I’ll just leave you two alone. Do try to behave. It’s so much more fun to have friends.”

Then she was off, her robes billowing behind her, leaving Draco with nothing to do but to stare at Potter.

“I wasn’t putting down your job, you know,” Potter said, for some reason still talking instead of leaving.

“That’s quite all right, Potter. I know you have abysmal social skills and no manners. Besides, I couldn’t possibly care less what you think of me or my career.”

“Right,” Potter said, blowing out his cheeks. “I guess I should leave, then.”

“I guess you should,” Draco said, reaching for his tea, which was far too tepid to be considered palatable. He didn’t trust his spell work a heating charm at the moment for and Draco couldn’t chance messing up a second-year spell in front of Potter, so he chugged it, knowing full well if you could chug your tea it should be vanished. 

“Guess I’ll see you around, Malfoy.”

“Perhaps,” Draco says, trying not to let his eyes linger on the way Potter looked as he walked away.

 

****

***~*~*~***

Despite what the public might think, Draco was not easily swayed.

Sometimes he wished he were the type of person to follow other people blindly—a simpleton who deflected from their own sense of inferiority by clinging to powerful people. It would’ve made explaining away his disgraces and mistakes a whole lot easier if that had been true. Instead, he’d been forced to make peace with the fact that his choices had been his and his alone. He’d regretted them, certainly, and been undeniably influenced by his upbringing and loyalty to his family. But at the end of the day, Draco knew he’d thought he was on the right side. At least for a little while. Unfortunately, Draco was nothing if not stubborn, and once he made a decision he stuck to it even if it killed him—or someone else.

It was not something Draco was proud of. Not the way he once had been—boasting of his superiority at every moment while looking for ways to lord it over people. 

It was not shame that drove Draco to isolate himself from most people, but a deep awareness of his shortcomings. The thing was, Draco didn’t want to take that risk again. It was easier to keep himself in check with routine and predictability. He knew he didn’t always have the best judgement and that wanting to do right by the people he loved didn’t give his poor choices any moral justification. 

Draco knew better now. Now he knew himself and he knew the world around him. 

Despite his shortcomings, Draco had no desire to change himself for other people. He’d done enough of that to last him a lifetime. It wasn’t until he’d left Hogwarts, found a place of his own and began to earn his own money that he’d come to appreciate the way independence and self reliance could lead to self acceptance.

It was easier to have no one to please but himself.

 

****

***~*~*~***

The thing about Potter being back in England was that there was simply no escaping him. When Draco went to work, all his colleagues could talk about in between spelling memos to other departments was, well, Potter. Had everyone seen his hair? His eyes were greener than before, weren’t they? Why was he back and where had he been? Did anyone know where he was living or working? On and on the endless questions went. Draco could’ve dealt with the gossip had it been useful, but no one ever knew any answers. By the following week, Draco was close to losing his mind. No one seemed to know a bloody thing about Potter and yet he was all they could talk about.

They made it nearly impossible for Draco to enjoy his lunch on Monday—leftover curry from the place across town, light on the spice and a double order of naan—because the break room had been full of nothing but Potter talk. Draco had ignored it best he could, but when Doris Marybeth who worked in the cubicle next to him sat down at the table to ask him his opinion on Potter’s sudden reappearance, he’d nearly choked on his naan. The look he sent her had been withering enough she’d left with an expression on her face as sour as Draco’s stomach. 

By the time Tuesday came around, Draco had reached unprecedented levels of curmudgeonly. The _Daily Prophet_ had released a full page article about what side of the bed they thought Potter preferred, Draco ran out of sugar, and he lost his favorite scarf. The only thing that kept him going was the promise of his usual afternoon scone and tea. At least there nothing could go wrong. After last week, Draco refused to believe Potter would find a way to ruin Draco’s scone consumption for a third time.

Oh, how wrong he was.

Draco had barely made his way into the hustle and bustle of Diagon Alley’s entryway, his boots clacking against the cobblestone road as he squared his shoulders and made his way down the street. He’d just turned the corner near Flourish and Blotts, his stomach making itself known with a growl, when a pair of trainers so hideous they threatened to make Draco’s eyes bleed caught his eye moments before a solid body sent him careening sideways. _Potter_.

He groaned, checking his left robe pocket to ensure his wand was still there before attempting to school his features into what he hoped would look like displeasure. 

“Excuse me, I’m so sorry,” Potter said, not sounding all that sorry. It was then that Draco noticed several important things. First, that man’s voice was an octave deeper than Potter’s; second, his eyes were much closer to the shade of mushy peas than emeralds; third, his hair was an ashy blonde; and lastly, he had a face that looked like a troll had sat on it. Definitely not Potter. And yet, there was something familiar about the hunch of the man’s shoulders and the way he clutched a book—perfectly wrapped in plain brown paper—to his chest.

“That’s quite alright it was all my fault,” Draco lied, eyes honed in to gauge the other man’s reaction. “I wasn’t watching where I was going.” Draco forced the fakest, most polite smile possible on his face and waited. 

The other man blinked, his mouth falling open in undisguised surprise. Draco resisted the urge to say ha. 

The man coughed, apparently aware of his expression and shaking his head. He plastered on a too-perfect smile—his teeth straight with absolutely no sign of the one sixteenth of an inch gap Potter had between his front teeth—across his face, but the damage was already done. 

“Are you alright, sir?” Draco said, suspicions nearly confirmed. “Perhaps you’ve been pottering around in the sun too long and need a drink. There’s a cafe down the street that serves the best tea.” He paused, clearing his throat for dramatic effect. It was unnecessary, since Potter-not-Potter was watching him as closely as a goblin at Gringotts. This time the smile that spread across Draco’s face was anything but faked. “And chocolate cupcakes.”

The man—not Potter but most certainly Potter—visibly blanched. For the briefest of moments, the tips of his hair turned black before returning to their dishwater-like excuse for blond. He shuffled his feet backward very slowly. “Oh no, that’s quite alright. It was my fault. So sorry.”

Before Draco could say another word, Potter had turned on his heels and disappeared into the crowd.

 

****

***~*~*~***

That night Draco dreamt of flying. He dreamt of open skies and long-abandoned dreams.

He dreamt of green eyes and laughter and a future that never was.

When his alarm went off at exactly six twenty-two the next morning, he did not remember his dreams but he had an unexplainable craving for a chocolate cupcake.

 

****

***~*~*~***

No matter how many times Draco said he didn’t care about Potter and why he was back in England dressed like a renegade bounty hunter or disguising himself to purchase top-secret books, it didn’t work. Draco was a wonderful liar, skilled in the art of facial deception and tone manipulation. Unfortunately, Draco was far too smart to fall for any of it and none of his usual tactics worked when the person he needed to deceive was himself.

Eventually, Draco decided it was normal human curiosity that had him reading the paper with extra scrutiny every morning looking for mentions of Potter, or scanning the crowds on his way to work, or looking at the shoppers on a late night, impromptu Marks & Spencer sweets run. It wasn’t that Draco cared about Potter in particular, it was simply that understanding what was going on would be a wise acquisition of knowledge. There were few things Draco hated more than other people knowing something he did not and this was no different.

Therefore, when Draco saw Potter’s head of dark hair disappearing into the crowd outside the Leaky Cauldron, it made perfect sense, as far as Draco was concerned, to follow.. He was already dressed in Muggle clothing from his morning trip to Tescos to replenish his supply of crisps. He’d decided to pop into Diagon Alley before going home to acquire a new pot of ink. Of course the ink was of little importance compared to the prospect of discovering exactly what Potter was up to.

Draco shoved his hands into his pockets before zig-zagging down the pavement. 

Potter was almost painfully easy to follow—his footsteps slow and his shock of hair serving like a beacon. If Draco weren’t so sure he didn’t care at all about Potter, he would have half a mind to have a stern word with Potter about paying attention to the possibility of being followed. Merlin only knew the type of odd sorts who might try to follow Potter with intentions far less benevolent than Draco’s.

After nearly half an hour, Draco began to question the wisdom of following Potter, who seemed to be walking with no purpose or sense of urgency, when the other man unexpectedly ducked into a storefront. It took Draco a few seconds to get his wits about him before he edged sideways, not even bothering to read the name of the store as he followed Potter inside. What he saw shocked him to the core.

_Toys._

Toys everywhere. Plastic robots and teddy bears and cuddly toys galore lined the front of the store while the rest of it was stocked with all sorts of things Draco had no name for. They lined every spare inch of the store with their bright colours and attractive packaging. 

Potter had come to a children’s toy store. The question, though, was why.

“Excuse me,” a female voice uttered from behind him, startling Draco back to the present, reminding him that he was blocking the entryway in full view of everyone—including Potter. 

Moving as quickly as if he were about to be hexed, Draco scurried behind a tall display of cuddly puppets, shoving his face against the wooden rack and peering out at Potter, who had his back turned to Draco and seemed to be eyeing a large display of odd plastic toys that looked like someone had tried to use polyjuice potion to turn into a turtle with disastrous results.

Potter grabbed two of the ugly turtle things, stuffing them under his arm before moving towards the queue, his body now turned towards Draco, who panicked before realising there was no way Potter could see him in his expertly chosen hiding spot. He allowed himself a long moment to take in Potter’s clothing—a pair of jeans that looked as if he worn them to a few rounds with a dragon that he’d lost, and a plain red t-shirt—were far less dramatic than what Draco had seen him wear on previous occasions. At least Potter had enough sense not wear his ridiculous coat and holster in front of Muggles. Or so Draco thought. 

Potter tapped his foot as he waited for the elderly man in front of him to fumble through his wallet for his cash. He squatted down, giving Draco a perfect view of his profile as he reached for a small rubber chicken on the bottom shelf of small toys and knick knacks beside the register and it was then that Draco nearly choked on his own spit. Not from the shock of seeing Potter’s face break out in a smile as he laughed at the abused chicken, nor at the fact that when he rose to stand he placed the chicken atop his bizarre turtle people. No, what had Draco requiring fresh air was the brief glimpse of a leather strap that appeared when Potters too big, hole-filled jeans stretched across the expanse of his thigh during his examination of the bottom shelf of toys.

Draco felt faint.

Potter was wearing the leather wand holster _under_ his jeans. Merlin and Morgana, would wonders never cease? He felt certain that by the time he was done with this important information collecting endeavor he would need something far stronger than a cup of tea with his scone.

This was absolutely ridiculous. No one needed a wand holster to buy muggle toys!

By the time the man in front of Potter finished paying, Potter had managed to add several more small toys to his growing pile of oddities, including a robotic dog, a horrifying toy with large eyes that looked like a pygmy puff somehow bred with a goblin, and something in a box called a Slinky. 

Despite his keen eyesight and impeccable observation skills, Draco did not possess the ability to read lips. And therefore, because of the sound coming from the pint-sized human now standing beside him wailing at the top of his lungs about something called a push pop, Draco couldn’t make out what Potter and the cashier were talking about.. The mother bent down to whisper something, which set the child off in an even louder scream and with a heavy sigh she reached out to pick up the now-flailing child. He grimaced, taking several steps back until he hit the wall.

With nowhere to escape without being seen, Draco turned towards the wall and came face to face with a large poster advertising something called a Stretch Armstrong. Draco balked at the picture. He had no idea Muggles enjoyed toys emulating human torture, and he winced at the overstretched human figure held in the hands of a manically smiling young Muggle child. He was so absorbed in confusion at the advertisement it took him longer than it should have to realise the screaming child had disappeared. Draco spun around to sneak another peek at the register and found that someone else had disappeared as well.

Wank bugger shitting arse head and hole, he was never going to figure out what Potter was up to.

 

****

***~*~*~***

“Oh, Draco, it’s so good to see you. When you didn’t come in on Tuesday like usual? I thought perhaps you’d been led astray by the group of wrackspurts that had taken up residence outside the cafe.” Luna smiled at him brightly, her long hair pulled to the side in a long braid woven with purple ribbons, perfectly complementing her lilac robes, which were covered in twinkling moons.

“No, I had some pressing business to attend to that took all of my afternoon, unfortunately,” Draco fibbed, toying with the dragon clasp on his robes. Luna was the only person to whom Draco found it distasteful to lie, even a small white lie. “You look nice today.”

“Oh,” Luna breathed, looking taken by surprise. Her smile brightened as she tucked a loose piece of hair behind her ear. “Thank you. You look handsome, as well. I like your new robe.”

Draco’s hand stilled on the clasp. “How do you know it’s new?”

“You always fidget with your new clothes the first time you wear them. It’s quite sweet, actually. But you needn’t worry; you look very handsome. You should really wear red more often.”

“This is not red,” Draco choked out, looking down at his new robes. He’d purchased them yesterday on a whim, drawn to the vibrant color through the shop window when he’d gone shopping with Pansy. “They’re a deep royal ruby.”

“I see,” Luna said softly. “I must be mistaken. They just reminded me of the shirt Harry was wearing last week.” She stared at Draco unblinking and Draco wondered, not for the first, time if Luna possessed the gift of clairvoyance. Not that she was right, of course. Draco absolutely did not buy new robes he didn’t need because they reminded him of Potter. Nothing could have been further from the truth.

Draco’s mouth fell open. “This is absolutely nothing like the attention-seeking colours Potter prefers. His are always very bright and ghastly. This is an understated shade of carmine, if you must know.”

Luna cocked her head to the side, reaching her hand across the counter to briefly graze the tips of her fingers across the soft material of his robe before pulling back. “It looks like Gryffindor red.”

Draco very nearly dropped dead. _Gryffindor red._

“You look pale. Well, more so than usual. Are you alright, Draco?”

Draco shook his head, distinctly aware of the tutting from the customers in queue behind him. “No, I’m quite alright, thank you. I’ll just take my usual to go, please.”

“Of course, anything else?” She asked, eyes wide and innocent. “A chocolate cupcake, perhaps? Your eyes seemed rather drawn to them in the case.”

Draco licked his lips, the memory of chocolate frosting clinging to Potter’s upper lip flashing through his mind. 

“Yes, I suppose I could be persuaded to buy one those. Simply as a supportive patron, of course. No idea if I’ll actually eat it, you know, but it's always good to have a spare sweet just in case of emergencies,” Draco said seriously, all while internally wondering what the bloody fuck he was rambling about. What in Merlin’s name someone might need a cupcake for during an emergency, he had no idea.

“Of course,” Luna said, as she busied herself boxing up Draco’s scone and cupcake into a small container. The top was clear and as she slid it across the counter, he could see the mounds of thick frosting and the tiny sugared rose petal—the same shade as Potter’s mouth—delicately adorning the top. “These have been very popular recently. Lots of people seem to like chocolate.”

Draco inhaled sharply. People. He couldn’t believe he was being so publicly called out like this.

“I’m not thinking about Potter, if that’s what you’re thinking. And I’m definitely not buying a chocolate cupcake because of him and his indecent habit of eating them in front of other people so lasciviously. That would be absolutely absurd. I can like chocolate all on my own.”

Luna seemed entirely unruffled by his words. “Whatever you say, Draco. You know yourself best, after all.”

Draco didn’t know what to say to that, so instead, after he paid, he dropped the entirety of his change into the bird-shaped tip jar and tried not to think too hard about his purchases.

He was so distracted by Luna’s words it took him much longer than it normally would have to notice there was a small commotion outside of Gringotts. Draco quickly shrunk his treats and pocketed them before meandering towards the gathering crowd.

“I swear to you I saw him go inside, Agnes,” a middle-aged man with a very round face said.

“Maybe you need your eyesight checked. He’s not in there now,” the woman, presumably Agnes, replied. She bore a striking resemblance to Longbottom’s boggart of Snape in a dress during third year.

Feigning casualness, Draco sipped his tea, scooting sideways along the wall closer to the door, where a group of teenagers looked close to fainting.

“I don’t have anything for them to sign. Do you think my arm would work?” one girl asked, shoving up the sleeves of her robes. 

Ah, someone famous, then. The last time he’d seen a fuss like this in Diagon Alley had been for that nitwit Lockhart. He couldn’t imagine anyone else who might warrant such attention. There’d been rumors Celestina Warbeck would be in town, but that wasn’t supposed to be for at least another fortnight.

“I don’t care what gets signed so long as I get touched!” the boy nearest Draco hissed. He caught Draco’s eye and blushed, turning his back and whispering something that Draco couldn’t make out to his two friends.

The other girl, who’d yet to speak, turned her eyes on Draco with an appraising look, her voice dripping with judgement. “You hoping to get an autograph, too?”

Draco startled at being addressed so blatantly. Most people tended to look right through him, which suited Draco just fine. His days of wanting to be the centre of attention were long gone.

“I’m sorry, are you talking to me?” he asked.

She wore an expression that said quite plainly, you're weird. She looked as if she couldn’t be more than thirteen and Draco wondered if he’d been so small and obnoxiously forward at that age.

“No one else hanging around snooping.”

“I am not snooping. This is a public area. I was merely finishing my tea before I went into this fine establishment to do my banking, not that you’d know anything about the affairs of grown-ups. Have you even got your Hogwarts letter yet?”

Her entire face contorted into a look of such surprise it was almost comical. She huffed loudly, turning her back on Draco and dragging her friends farther away. 

Honestly, he thought, edging his way closer to a new group, no one had any respect for their elders anymore.

“I’m telling you, he’ll come out eventually. He can’t hide in there forever. It’s a miracle the goblins even let him keep his money here after what he did,” a young woman said matter of factly.

“Not like he had any choice!” the other one countered. 

“I’ve read Rita Skeeter’s book. He had choices. I mean let’s be real, yes, he defeated He Who Must Not Be Named, but look at all the stuff he did along the way. He’s clearly desperate for attention and has no regard for anyone but himself,” the first girl said. She pretended to examine her nails. 

Draco’s stomach flipped uncomfortably with dawning comprehension.

“You’re only bitter because he never answered your fan mail,” the other girl said, pressing her face against the glass door.

Her friend made a vaguely offended noise. “I never sent him fan mail.”

“Did so,” she said, turning to her friend. “Sent him your knickers and everything when you were pissed last year, remember?”

“I don’t know why I even talk to you, you’re horrible,” she said, looking like she wished the earth would swallow her whole. 

Draco almost felt sorry for her. _Almost._

“We’re sisters,” she answered. “Besides, I bet loads of people have sent Harry Potter their knickers. I’m sure you’re not the only girl he’s rejected. I bet there are loads! Besides, he dated that Hufflepuff boy when he went back to Hogwarts, remember? My friend Hannah told me all about it. Which means I bet loads of boys have sent him their knickers, too, or er...their pants. So see, you’re nothing special.”

“Ugh, I hate you. I need an ice cream now,” she sighed, tugging on her sister’s sleeve. “You’re buying.”

“But I want to see Harry Potter!” She looked put out.

“I heard he’s a bit of a tosser,” a male voice interjected.

Draco jumped, wondering where this new fellow had come from. He was tall with dark reddish-brown hair and instead of a robe he was wearing the most hideous neon shell suit that made a whooshing noise when his arms rubbed against his sides. To add insult to injury, his trousers were the same ghastly colour and material. Draco felt as if he were owed an apology for having to look at it with his own eyes.

He frowned, fully prepared to walk away and leave the entire unfortunate situation behind him, when the man began to walk away. Along with the horrifying swishing sound his trousers made as he walked, Draco noticed his now-familiar pair or trainers.

It couldn’t be, and yet.

Draco’s feet began to move almost of their own accord, paying close attention to the way the stranger seemed to put more weight on the balls of his feet. He tried to imagine the man with darker hair and a different face, and Draco groaned in confirmation when the man lifted his hand to rub at his forehead before hunching his shoulders and shoving his hands into the pockets of his shell suit jacket.

Merlin’s beard, someone needed to tell Potter his disguises were shit. 

Potter looked around suspiciously before ducking down an abandoned alleyway between Gambol and Japes and the Magical Menagerie. 

Draco hesitated. Following Potter once was merely a fact-finding mission. Nothing strange about that at all. Anyone else would have done the exact same thing had they been in his position. Doing it twice, however, bordered on what some people might have mistakenly called stalking, and while Draco knew that it most certainly was _not_ —that he was simply doing it to gain information and not because he cared about what was going on—he wasn’t sure anyone else would see it that way. 

Of course, then Draco remembered it was unlikely anyone else would ever find out, since his sleuthing powers were unmatched. He straightened his back and squared his shoulders, decision made. He chucked the remainder of his tea into the nearest rubbish bin before slowly making his way down the darkened alley. It took a few seconds for his eyes to adjust, but once they did he frowned. Potter wasn’t there.

He walked forward, eyes raking over the empty animal crates piled precariously high along the bricks and the unmarked boxes lining the other wall. This didn’t make a lick of sense. Draco could clearly see the end of the alley, which was littered with rubbish and feathers. There was nowhere to go. It was possible Potter had Disapparated and Draco had just declared his mission a failure when an indistinct glimmer near a stack of boxes caught his eye. He blinked, vision zooming in on the edge of the box as he inched his way closer. For just for a moment, the corner of the utmost box seemed to disappear.

Somebody was there. Somebody wearing an invisibility cloak. _Potter._

Draco felt victorious. He’d outwitted Potter. Potter could hide nothing from Draco. He didn’t even bother trying to mask the smile that spread across his face.

A smile that was wiped away two seconds later when the invisibility cloak was removed to reveal the same hideous shell suit, but instead of a stranger looking back at him, it was Potter, complete with his mess of hair and crooked nose.

It occured to Draco then that he’d made one fatal error in his plan. Somehow he’d failed to to remember that if he could see Potter, that Potter could see him. 

“Why are you following me?” Potter asked, tiling his head to the side and studying Draco with a furrowed brow.

“Your outfit is hideous,” Draco blurted.

“You’re following me because you don’t like my clothes?” Harry asked with wide eyes.

“Yes, you need to take it off immediately,” he agreed, pleased with his own quick thinking.

Potter appeared to be fighting back a smile as he took one step closer to Draco. “So you want me naked?”

Draco paled. That was not what he’d meant at all. Leave it to Potter to get things completely wrong as usual, the absolute pillock.

“No!”

“You either want me to keep my clothes on or you don’t,” Potter said, body shaking with repressed laughter. The sight was so familiar Draco felt faint. 

“Of course I want you to keep your clothes on. I just think you should do us all a favor and not subject us to that monstrosity you’re wearing.”

“Oh yeah, and what exactly do you suggest I wear?”

“Anything would be better,” Draco snorted. “That outfit you wore to the toy shop wasn’t half bad. Plain perhaps, and your trousers were in desperate need of a Reparo but at least it wasn’t bright enough to make my eyes bleed.”

Potter’s mouth fell open and Draco didn’t have time to enjoy having made Potter look like a toad because the reality of what he’d just said hit him with all the force of a Full-Body Bind. 

In a fit of sheer panic, Draco shoved his hand into his pocket, sweaty fingers clasping around his wand. The last thing he saw before he Disapparated was Potter’s painfully green eyes watching him.

 

****

***~*~*~***

The next Tuesday, when Draco would normally go by Erumpents and Crumpets when he got off work early, he instead found himself strolling aimlessly through Muggle London, eventually ending up at M&S with a Colin the Caterpillar cake in his trolley and more crisps than any one human could possibly need at any given time. It wasn’t that he was avoiding Diagon Alley, or any one person with dark hair and a crooked smile in particular, he’d simply felt like doing something different, was all.

That night he sat alone in his kitchen, stabbing his fork directly into the head of the odd cake instead of serving himself a slice. 

The following week came and went without Draco stepping foot in Diagon Alley. He still wasn’t avoiding it, life had merely been busy. When Tuesday came around, Draco simply didn’t have time to head over for his usual scone and tea, having decided his entire flat was in need of a good tidy without magic.

By the third week, Draco was at his wits’ end. He was fed up with everything for absolutely no discernible reason, had gotten chastised at work for the first time ever for failing to finish his work on time, and had stumbled into an unexplainable bout of bad luck. Equally as frustrating, despite having sampled scones at no fewer than ten Muggle establishments near his flat, none of them had come close to as good as Luna’s. Loath as Draco was to admit it, it wasn’t just the food or beverages he missed, either. He missed Luna’s easy conversation and the familiarity of his favourite cafe. 

Potter be damned, Draco was going to get his bloody scone if it killed him. Not that he was avoiding Potter, of course. That would’ve been ridiculous. 

Draco didn’t care about Potter at all.

 

****

***~*~*~***

Draco’s steps quickened the closer he got to the cafe.

This was fine. Better than fine. Those silly interactions with Potter had been a small but unavoidable embarrassment but the more he thought about it, the more certain he became that Potter was likely giving as little thought to the matter as Draco.

Life could go on as usual, and Draco could easily continue to ignore whispers of Potter’s name or his face in the paper. More than half of Draco’s life had been filled with talk of Potter in some form, so it made sense he thought of him from time to time, but it didn’t mean anything. If Draco happened to run into Potter, then it would be no problem at all to simply pretend he didn’t see him. 

By the time Draco’s hand pushed open the door to Luna’s cafe, he’d managed to minimise his interactions with Potter into non-existence. A short-lived reality that was shattered the moment he saw Potter sitting at one of the small tables in the corner. Several empty tea cups were scattered around the table, a half-eaten chocolate cupcake on a plate beside him. Potter’s face was screwed up in concentration as he read something from an oversized book in front of him. His attention was fixed on whatever he was reading, and Draco could easily slip back out of the cafe unnoticed should he choose to do so.

Unfortunately for Draco, his judgement was fundamentally flawed where Potter was involved.

His feet did not direct him towards the short queue as they should have but instead had him weaving his way through the half-filled tables until he was standing directly beside Potter’s. Up close, he could read the title of the book Potter had his face buried in— _Tricky Transfiguration Made Easy_. He also realised that Potter must’ve been here for even longer than he’d initially suspected, if the pile of cupcake liners stuffed in one of the empty tea cups was anything to go by. Honestly, did no one look out for Potter? Chocolate cupcakes and tea were no way to nourish oneself.

“You’re going to make yourself sick if you continue to sustain yourself on nothing but sweets,” Draco trolled.

Potter’s head shot up from behind his book. If he was shocked Draco was standing there talking to him, he didn’t show it. “If Voldemort couldn’t do me in, then I don’t think a couple of chocolate cupcakes will.”

His tone was sharp and the dark humor didn’t suit him. 

“Yes, well, it’s not good for you.”

Potter’s tongue darted out to swipe his bottom lip, a nervous habit he’d picked up at the beginning of their eighth year. Draco wondered if he still had nightmares, too.

“Is that all you came to tell me?” Potter asked. He folded his hands atop his book and Draco noticed the ink stains on his inner finger and a burn mark on the inside of his left wrist near the pale blue vein.

“Someone ought to tell you,” Draco answered, puffing out his chest.

Potter nodded solemnly, still staring at Draco. 

Draco clearly hadn’t thought this through. Truthfully, he wasn’t sure he’d thought at all. He never did seem to be able to think around Potter.

“I’m sorry about before,” Draco found himself saying. “I suddenly recalled I’d left my kettle on.”

Draco wasn’t sure why he was offering up an apology without prompting. He certainly didn’t owe Potter one. Not for his abrupt departure weeks before. Not for anything.

“Your kettle?” Potter repeated with a raised eyebrow.

Draco nodded. “Yes, nifty invention that helps you make tea. If you’ve never seen one, you should really check them out, they’re—”

“I know what a fucking kettle is,” Potter interrupted. His lip twitched up in the corner and some of the unease in Draco’s stomach settled. Not because he cared about Potter’s emotional comfort but because it was clearly indicative of his impeccable social skills that he could make Potter feel at ease in conversation.

“Right, good,” Draco said, tapping his fingers against his thigh.

Potter sighed, running a hand through his hair. It made the mass of waves stand up on one side in a way that, under the right circumstances, could almost be considered obnoxiously attractive. Well, if one were drawn to someone who was the human embodiment of a disaster.

“You know, before, the first time I saw you in here, you were so polite I thought perhaps you weren’t still angry at me. Then you follow me down that alley, and apparently to the toy store, and now I don’t know what to think.”

“Thinking was always hard for you,” Draco answered automatically. He gave Potter a wry smile that Potter didn’t return.

“Cut the bullshit, Malfoy.”

Draco stiffened. “If you’d like me to leave, you need merely say so. I have no desire to foist my company upon someone who doesn’t desire it.”

“I wasn’t the one who wanted to stop being friends and you know it,” Potter answered, his voice tight.

“I didn’t—that is to say,” Draco paused, trying to collect his thoughts. “That was never my intention.”

“Sit down, Malfoy,” Potter said. Draco didn’t move, frozen to the stop as if hexed. “Please.”

That got him moving. He pulled out a chair, sweeping Potter’s rubbish and cups out of his way and staring at the table.

“You could’ve fooled me, you know,” Potter started quietly. “That last month before we were set to leave, I asked where you were going to live and you told me it was none of my concern. I thought maybe you were just nervous about leaving Hogwarts, but the closer it got, the more you pulled away. You didn’t want to study together, then you didn’t want to fly together. Our last day there, I looked everywhere for you to say goodbye but you were nowhere.”

Draco’s vision blurred. “You thought I was pulling away?”

Potter’s eyes widened, making him look like an overgrown Pygmy Puff. It would’ve been funnier if Draco didn’t feel close to losing the pitiful contents of his stomach.

“What was I supposed to think?”

“You kept talking about the future!” Draco said, as if that explained everything. 

“Yeah well, that was sort of the point. The future was in front of us. Voldemort was gone and I thought—well, it doesn’t matter what I thought.”

For the first time in a long time, Draco felt his control slipping. His self preservation skills were screaming run away now before things got messy—before someone got hurt—but there was something in the way Potter watched him that made every wise thought fly out of Draco’s brain, sacrificed to his inability to ever do the logical fucking thing where Potter was concerned.

“What did you think?” Draco asked, voice barely above a whisper.

“I thought one of my best friends hated me.”

Draco’s ears rang. Surely he’d misheard Potter. “I’m sorry, _what_?”

Potter hunched his shoulders, poking at the edge of his cupcake with his finger and coating the tip in chocolate frosting. “You heard me.”

“Granger and Weasley are your best friends,” Draco said automatically, feeling as if he were rapidly losing all sense of reality. He and Potter had become close during eighth year, certainly, but Draco had never even hoped that Potter might have thought of it in the same way he had. 

“Funny thing about best friends: you can have more than one or two,” Potter snapped. He looked up the second the words were out of his mouth, lips thinning. “Sorry,” he added, scrubbing his hand across his cheek. “My mind healer says I have anger issues.”

“Mind healer,” Draco repeated stupidly. 

He thought back to the Potter he’d gradually got to know that first year after the war—always too quiet or too loud. Potter, who’d refused all offers from McGonagall to see a mind healer and who’d insisted he was fine day after day, despite mounting evidence to the contrary. Even as his roommate, it’d taken Draco months to realise Potter had charmed his bed to contain the terrors that only came out in sleep. It took him longer still to get Potter to talk about them. At the time, he’d thought it was because he felt he’d owed Potter a life debt. It wasn’t until much later he’d realised it was something else entirely.

Despite their growing closeness back then, he’d always feared it was situational—doomed to end. He had known that eventually Potter would leave Hogwarts and return to the light, and Draco would forever remain in the shadows of society. Living in the periphery—allowed to live in peace only so long as people could forget his existence.

“Yeah,” Potter uttered, lifting his eyes to look at Draco. The look on his face was full of such familiarity it stole the breath from Draco’s lungs. The lines of Potter’s face he’d once known so well. The laughter he’d begun to share, the secrets he helped carry, and the expressions he’d begun to learn to decipher. 

Not once in the last seven months had he allowed himself to admit how much he’d missed Potter. The painful reality of that repressed mourning assaulted him with the weight of an Unforgivable—staggering in its intensity.

“Thought you said you’d never see a mind healer,” Draco said, more a statement than a question.

“Did a lot of things I never thought I’d do,” Potter answered, popping the frosting-covered finger into his mouth and sucking it clean. There was an almost imperceptible flush spreading across his cheeks and the ache in Draco’s chest magnified.

“You could uh—tell me about it,” Draco said, twisting his fingers atop the table. 

Potter quirked his head to the side. “You won’t disappear again, will you?”

Draco shook his head. 

It would be smarter to leave. Easier to walk away now before things got complicated and messy and too confusing even for Draco, well versed as he was at manipulating his desires, to untangle. And yet.

“I won’t leave,” he whispered.

Potter’s smile was nearly blinding. Merlin’s fucking beard, Potter was going to kill him.

Oh well, Draco thought, settling back in his chair. He’d resigned himself to his imminent mortality more than once. If he were going to go now, death by Potter’s friendship was at least preferable to death by a dark lord.

 

****

***~*~*~***

Over the next few weeks, Draco did a lot of thinking. Just not about Potter.

He did not think about the way Potter’s laughter was softer than before, but his smiles were brighter. 

He didn’t think about Potter’s attempts to exist solely on sweets or the way he looked licking frosting from his thumbs before blushing when he caught Draco staring. Nor did he think about how much both of those things made Draco want to make sure someone was watching out for Potter, or how much he wanted to be that person.

He did not think about the adorable way Potter’s lips moved when he was deep in concentration reading one of his transfiguration books, his hands swirling through the air mimicking wand movements. 

He didn’t think about easily they fell into an unspoken routine of meeting at Luna’s multiple times a week. And he especially did not think about how it felt like he was coming increasingly closer and closer to admitting what he wanted from those meetings wasn’t to be found on Luna’s menu.

Because thinking about any of those things would make them _real_ , would make the feelings terrifyingly tangible because it would then become something Draco wanted. And once it was something he wanted, well, then it became something he could lose.

 

****

***~*~*~***

“What on earth are you doing?” Draco asked, louder than was strictly necessary given the relative quiet of Diagon Alley. The only other person in sight was a wizened old witch walking an invisible something on a leash and Potter, who was stood outside Erumpents and Crumpets with two to-go cups in his hand and a smile far bigger than could possibly be warranted at quarter past nine on a Saturday morning. Normal people were still in bed. Normal people were not standing in the cold looking like an absolute loon with hair that didn’t look like it had been brushed in days.

Normal people didn’t wear a bloody fucking wand holster to get tea in the morning. A mystery Draco had, as of yet, not solved. 

Of course, Draco wasn’t really one to judge, as he had it on good authority normal people didn’t find all of those ridiculous things endearingly attractive.

“Nothing,” Potter answered, practically bouncing on his heels.

“If you were doing nothing you’d be dead, therefore you’re doing something. Breathing at the very least. I mean realistically, it is entirely possible you’re not doing anything but breathing, but I’ll let it slide as I know it might be too early for your brain to be functioning at full capacity.”

“Fuck you,” Potter laughed, holding out one of the cups.

“Ouch, Potter, you wound me,” Draco lied, ignoring the flutter in his stomach as his fingers brushed over Potter’s roughened knuckles. 

“As if anything anyone else said could affect you,” Potter rebuffed. He wrapped his hands around his cup and lifted it up to his mouth, lips pursing as a blew at the steam swirling out of the small opening.

“You’d be surprised what might hurt me,” Draco answered automatically.

Potter stared at him unblinking as he sipped his drink and Draco had the sudden clarity to realise exactly how telling that single sentence had been. Too much. Too open. Too vulnerable.

“Why the bloody hell are we drinking outside like uncivilised plebeians?” he asked, ignoring the way his throat was beginning to close off.

“Because we’re going somewhere,” Potter answered, cupping his drink and shoving the other hand into the pocket of his jeans, which, for once, didn’t look like they’d been on the losing end of a fight with something out of the great lake.

“Somewhere? Could you possibly be more vague, honestly. If this is some pathetic excuse to kidnap me, you’ll be very disappointed to learn that the entirety of the Malfoy estate was confiscated by the Ministry the day I left Hogwarts. So I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad news but any attempts at collecting a ransom will be for naught.”

Instead of laughter, there was only silence. 

“Is that why you were gone that last day?” Potter whispered.

Oh, bloody buggering fuck. 

Draco really needed to learn to watch what he said around Potter. It was dangerous, the way the other man’s company made things come out of Draco’s mouth that he’d never meant to say.

“Possibly,” Draco said, feigning interest in the hangnail on his thumb.

“Is that why you didn’t want to talk about what we were going to do after Hogwarts? Did you know that was coming?” Potter asked. His voice was quiet, curious, and lacking the kind of judgement Draco had come to expect from people when they discovered his family’s misfortune. 

“I didn’t want to see your face when you found out. I didn’t want to know if you thought it was what I deserved, and if you said you didn’t think I deserved that then...then you would’ve been lying.” He forced himself not to look away. Not to let his shame show.

“I’m sorry,” Potter said. He sounded like he meant it.

“Why?” Draco asked, unable to stop himself. “You hated my father. You hated what the family name stood for. We deserved what we got. Everyone thinks so.”

“Sometimes it doesn’t matter what other people think. Sometimes it matters what you think,” Potter answered.

Draco gripped his cup so tight the lid popped. “Is that you or your mind healer talking?” He ignored the hot tea splashing onto the corner of his hand from the force of his grip, and hoped Potter didn’t notice.

“Dunno, little bit of each maybe. Does it matter, though? It’s still true.”

“I don’t care what other people think of me. I never did.”

“Oh,” Potter said, his eyes impossibly bright. He inhaled slowly, seemingly mulling over his words before he spoke. “Why didn’t you ever tell me, then?”

“Because,” Draco answered, “you’ve never been other people.” The I _cared what you thought_ went unspoken, but Potter seemed to get the meaning just the same.

Draco cleared his throat; the quiet intensity with which Potter watched him was almost too much to bear. “So where exactly are we going? I hate surprises, you know. I demand you tell me this instant.”

“No.” Potter shook his head, a long wisp of hair falling behind his glasses as he held out one hand.

“What do you mean _no_? No one tells me no,” he said, eyeing Potter’s outstretched fingers.

“No,” Potter said again, then laughed at his own cheekiness. Ridiculous. He was utterly ridiculous. 

“Ha, very funny, Potter,” Draco snorted, doing his best not to laugh.

The smile Potter directed at him was not charming. Absolutely not. He would not cave.

Potter looked pleased with himself, wiggling his fingers out at Draco. “Come on, do you trust me?”

“Yes,” Draco answered without hesitation, reaching out and linking his fingers with Potter’s.

A brief look of surprise flashed across Potter’s face, replaced immediately with a radiant smile. Draco didn’t have time to make sure he didn’t think about the way that smile made him feel before the all-too-familiar sensation of Side-Along Apparition hit him. He squeezed his eyes shut, opening them a moment later to find they were in a darkened alley.

“I knew you were going to try and kidnap me, Potter,” Draco grumbled, momentarily unsettled as he attempted to regain his bearings.

“If I wanted you alone, I would have asked,” Potter answered, dropping Draco’s hand but not his gaze.

Draco felt momentarily Stupefied.

“Right, so this is a Muggle area; you’ll need to take off your robe,” Potter instructed, setting his cup on the edge of a brick wall as he bent over to undo the fastenings on his wand holster. Draco’s mouth was dry, tongue suddenly too big for his mouth as he watched Potter’s fingers deftly unfasten the leather buckles at his upper thigh. When he finished, he pulled his wand from the holster, shrunk the holster, and shoved them both into his pocket.

Potter raised an eyebrow at Draco, who swiftly realised he hadn’t moved a muscle. With record speed, and less grace than he normally possesed, he undid the buttons at the shoulder of his robe, folding it into a neat square before shrinking and pocketing it.

“I like your shirt,” Potter said with a soft smile. He looked pleased in a way that Draco wasn’t familiar with, but with which he very much hoped to become acquainted. 

It was only then that Draco realised what it was he’d worn beneath his robe. The t-shirt Potter had given him as an early birthday present weeks before they left Hogwarts. It was a pale blue, impossibly soft, with the words _I’m not arguing, I’m simply explaining why I’m right_ written across the chest. It was absolutely nothing like what Draco normally wore and he’d scoffed when Potter had given it to him, insisting he would never wear it.

“I forgot to do laundry. It was the only clean thing in my entire flat. I was forced to put it on,” Draco lied, tugging on the hem of the shirt he normally wore only for sleeping. Something had possessed him to pull the familiar garment over his head that morning, an act which had seemed harmless enough at the time. Of course, he hadn’t counted on anyone knowing what he had on beneath his robe, especially not Potter. He almost thought being naked would have been less revealing than this. 

“It suits you,” Potter said, reaching for his cup and taking a drink. 

Draco crossed his arms over his chest, ignoring the blush he felt spreading across the bridge of his nose.

“Alright, so where are we, then?”

“The Entertainer,” Potter answered. 

Draco blinked. That meant nothing to him. 

Potter seemed to recognise his confusion and elaborated. “It’s a Muggle toy store, though not the the one you followed me into a few weeks ago.”

“For the millionth time, Potter, I was not following you. It was merely a freak accident that I ended up in the same shop as you, is all.”

“Uh huh,” Potter said, voice dripping with disbelief.

“Oh shut up,” Draco laughed, ducking his head as he followed Potter out of the alley and into the mid-morning light of the Muggle neighborhood. 

All around them, people strolled up and down the pavement. Draco’s eyes were drawn to a busker with a three-legged dog on the corner. There was a bucket on the ground, and though the man’s front teeth were missing and he had no shoes, the sign in front of his bucket read _“Music for Millie—I don’t need much but my pup needs food. Thank you.”_

“This way,” Potter said, tugging on Draco’s arm and pointing towards the storefront a few feet away. A small child holding their mother’s hand laughed joyfully as a wave of bubbles cascaded out the open doors. Draco had to remind himself that Muggles didn’t have magic as he watched the luminescent orbs float by, several of them popping on his t-shirt as they stepped inside the brightly lit store. For a brief moment, Draco forgot his age. He forgot his past. He was simply a child again, reminded of the first time his mother had taken him into a toy shop in Paris when he was four.

“Wow,” Draco breathed. This was nothing like the tiny toy shop he’d followed Potter into weeks ago. Instead, this one was massive, with shelves upon shelves of bright toys, whimsical plushes, and a tiny animated train that wound its way around the register.

Potter bit his bottom lip, rocking on his heels. “S’pretty cool, right? My Aunt Petunia never used to let me come inside. She said I’d break something with my ‘unnaturalness’, or that I’d try to steal.” His voice took on an unaffected tone but Draco could see the way Potter’s nails dug into the palms of his hands as he spoke. “I remember pressing my face up against the glass and watching Dudley grab toys like they were free. I used to promise myself if I was ever rich, I’d come back and buy every toy.”

“Is that what you’re doing now, making up for your lost childhood?” Draco asked, broaching the subject he’d as of yet been too afraid to touch. He thinks of spinning tops and plastic frogs, spilling from Potter’s pockets, green eyes lingering on toys in shop windows in Diagon Alley, and of course the toy store incident which Draco refused to admit was an incident. Not that he’s judging Potter. He’s just curious, is all.

“No,” Potter said, walking towards a display of something called an Etch A Sketch. “Or maybe yes. Maybe a little bit. My mind healer says I never had the chance to be a child.”

“And what is it you think?” Draco asked calmly, mimicking Potter’s advice from earlier.

“Cheeky wanker,” Potter laughed, grazing his fingers across the Etch A Sketch before picking it up. Draco watched with rapt attention as Potter turned the knobs and a crudely drawn picture began to appear on the tiny screen.

“That’s not an answer,” Draco said, leaning into Potter’s personal space to peer over his shoulder to get a better view of whatever he was trying to draw.

“I just want to make people happy,” Potter said. “I uh...I want to be a toymaker.”

Draco searched Potter’s face but found no indication if he were seriousn or not.

“Like Father Christmas?” Draco laughed. When Potter didn’t laugh with him, Draco realised he wasn’t joking. “Wait, you’re not taking the piss, are you?”

Potter shook his head, setting the Etch A Sketch back on the shelf. Though it had a few mistakes, the drawing was unmistakably a Snitch.

“There aren’t many toy shops in the wizarding world. None, actually. You can get things by mail order, or custom charmed if your family can afford it. But so far as I can tell, there’s nothing like this,” Potter said, eyes roaming over the toy shop, “for wizarding children. Especially not poor ones. No where they can go and find charmed frogs that can jump ten feet, spinning tops that don’t topple over, or bubble wands that never run out of bubbles. We’ve got magic, but wizards are missing out on a different kind of magic. I mean, there’s Zonkos and Weasley’s Wizard Wheezes, but most of those things are one time use and there aren’t many toys, just jokes. I want to make a space kids can come and just...stay if they have nowhere else to go. Even if they can’t buy anything.”

Draco swallowed, taking a step back to observe the arch of Potter’s hunched spine and the line of his jaw as he ducked his head. 

“You think it’s stupid, don’t you?”

“No,” Draco replied. Potter didn’t look like he believed him.

“I haven’t told anyone else yet. Not even Ron and Hermione. They know I’ve been working on something, but they sort of...well, I think they’re afraid to push too much. They think I’ll leave again. So they haven’t asked, even though I know they want to.”

“And are you? Going to leave again?” Draco asked, heart thumping so loud he was surprised Potter didn’t notice it. He wanted to believe the answer didn’t matter, but even Draco wasn’t that good of a liar.

“No,” Potter breathed, “I think maybe I was just looking for something.”

“Did you find what you were looking for?” Draco asked, almost scared to breathe.

“I’m getting there,” Potter said. He shoved his hands into his pockets and shook the hair from his eyes before nudging Draco’s shoulder with his own. “Come on, there’s something I want to show you.”

“No,” Draco said, three minutes later once Potter had dragged him to the back corner of the shop, where oversized neon balls with eyes stared back at him.

“Come on, just get on!” Potter said. “It’s not hard.”

“I am not riding a—a—” Draco waved his hand around in the general direction of the offending supposed toy, refusing to admit he couldn’t remember the name.

“Space bouncy,” Potter supplied with a bit too much glee as he wrapped his not-at-all elegant fingers with his bitten-down nails and ink stains around the long inflated handles on the top of the ball before straddling it and plopping his arse down. Potter’s entire body bounced—his hair flying up at the sides and his glasses slipping down his nose—as he let out an unexpected sound of exuberance.

Potter did it again, laughing louder as his entire arse lifted off the ball. Figures Potter was the type of person that made it necessary for a child’s ball to have safety handles. 

“I’m still not going to get on one of those,” Draco said to no one in particular, futilely ignoring the way his chest suddenly felt too small. It was like eighth year all over again, except this time Draco was determined not to fuck it up.

“Come on,” Potter said a bit breathlessly, “it’s fun.”

“I feel like perhaps we have different definitions of fun,” Draco said, unable to take his eyes off the way Potter’s hair continued to rise and fall with every jump. “Riding balls is not my idea of fun.”

Potter’s entire body stilled, a look of surprise spreading across his face. Before he had a chance to right his posture, he tipped sideways and slammed into the wall, then slid flat on his his back, his eyes squeezed shut.

“Are you alright?” Draco yelled, dropping to his knees and crawling over to see if Potter had hit his head. Potter’s body was trembling and fuck, Draco didn’t know if he could side-along him to St Mungos. He wasn’t as strong as Potter. No one was. Fear flooded his body at the idea of Potter being injured. He couldn’t believe the absolute fucker had survived the Dark Lord only to be done in by a space bouncy.

“Potter, where does it hurt?” Draco asked, uncaring that he sounded frantic. He placed his palms on the flat of Potter’s stomach—the worn cotton of his t-shirt soft beneath Draco’s fingers as he tried not to think about the fact that he was touching Potter.

“You don’t like riding balls,” Potter choked out, looking close to having a fit. He clutched his stomach as the trembling in his body turned into full-body laughter that erupted with a roar. Oh. Oh. 

“For fuck’s sake, I can’t believe I’m friends with you,” Draco grumbled, dropping onto his arse and shoving Potter with his foot.

Potter laughed harder, rolling onto his side to face Draco. He either wasn’t aware or didn’t care that the teenaged Muggle who Draco was pretty sure worked there was watching them with undisguised annoyance. 

“Your face. You were so serious. I don’t like riding balls,” Potter mimicked the last bit, voice taking on a ridiculously high pitch in imitation of what Draco could only assume was meant to be his accent.

“First of all, I don’t sound like that,” Draco said, wondering if he did, in fact, sound like that. “Second of all, it is not that bloody funny.”

“It sort of is that funny,” Potter disagreed, moving into a sitting position and crossing his legs. He leaned forward, elbows on his knees and eyes on Draco. He’d thankfully stopped laughing, but his cheeks were flushed and his face was alight with mirth. 

Draco wondered if this Muggle store lacked proper ventilation, which would be the only logical conclusion as to why he suddenly felt breathless and flushed. “You’re like a child, Potter.”  
“Thanks,” Potter said, dropping his chin into his upturned hands and looking pleased.

Draco wrinkled his nose. “That was not a compliment.”

“Was to me,” Potter shrugged. “Adults are boring. They use people and they don’t remember what fun is for. I’ve seen what adults are capable of, and if that’s what I have to look forward to then I just don’t want to grow up.”

“You can’t just decide not to grow up,” Draco objected, throwing his hands into the air.

“Is that a challenge?” Potter asked, eyes flashing with excitement.

Draco snorted, well aware of what he was walking into.

“No. No, it’s not, Potter. Calm down and stop looking like someone told you that Christmas was coming early. Mark my words, in ten or fifteen years you’ll be wearing grown-up trousers with shoes that don’t look like you’re preparing for your first day of nursery school and you’ll be talking about bills and whether you got enough sleep the night before.”

“Challenge accepted,” Potter replied with glee, willfully ignoring Draco’s previous insinuation that it was not, in fact, a challenge.

“You’re fucking hopeless,” Draco said, but his lips were quirking up in the corners with a smile even his impeccable self control couldn’t seem to contain. “I still say I’m right.”

“Guess you’ll just have to stick around and find out, then.”

Draco thought of the future, of a decade of being Potter’s friend under his belt. A decade of laughter and companionship. A decade of knowing he was not doomed to a life of mediocrity and silence.

“I suppose I will,” he answered.

Potter’s smile lit the entire store. 

Draco smiled back.

 

****

***~*~*~***

Over the next few weeks, he and Potter fell into an easy routine. Tea at Luna’s several times a week. Takeaway at his or Potter’s flat. Trips to toy stores all over England for research that felt a lot more like playtime. Spur of the moment excursions, including the time Potter fell asleep on Draco’s sofa and woke up at midnight with a hankering for Chinese, which had resulted in the procurement of an international portkey and the strangest sunrise breakfast Draco had ever experienced.

It was nice. It was easy. Draco hoped things would never change.

But change they did.

 

****

***~*~*~***

“I’m starving,” Potter complained, kicking his leg out from beneath his arse. He shifted into a slouch until he was sitting almost sideways in a position that could not be remotely comfortable. It was as if the idea of sitting like a normal person offended Potter; he did everything in his power to sit in the most ridiculous positions, incessantly fidgeting.

“We just had supper an hour ago,” Draco said, thinking back to the entire takeaway container of curry and double order of naan Potter had polished off as if he hadn’t been fed in a week. He’d even eaten the last few bites of Draco’s.

“That was food, though,” Potter said, as if that made things any clearer. 

Apparently incapable of remaining in one spot for more than sixty seconds, he had the audacity to the throw his leg over the back of Draco’s prized green-velvet sofa and tipped his head off the edge. His glasses slipped down his face and his hair tumbled over the curve of the dark cushion in a waterfall of thick black locks. 

“Yes, Potter. Food is generally what humans consume.”

Potter made a rude gesture in his general direction. “I want something sweet.”

Ah, of course. Draco had expected that, just not quite so soon. Potter was incapable of going a day without his evening sweet treat. 

Draco was tempted to tease him about his sugar addiction, but Potter’s off-handed confession at Hogwarts sprung to mind—“ _Aunt Petunia never let me have any, I never got any until I came to Hogwarts._ ”

“I might have something in the kitchen that could pass as dessert,” Draco said evasively, as if he hadn’t made a rushed trip to Marks & Spencer for cupcakes and biscuits on his lunch break the moment he’d got the owl from Potter that morning inviting himself to Draco’s flat with the promise of takeaway. 

Potter sat up so fast his glasses fell off his face. “You’ve got pudding?”

Draco tried hard to ignore the swooping sensation in the pit his stomach that was becoming a more regular occurrence when he was around Potter, especially when Potter looked at him like that. So what if Draco liked making Potter happy, liked making him smile. Potter was easy to please, was all, and it was nice to be able to be the cause of someone’s happiness for once. It didn’t mean anything in particular if Potter was the only person Draco funneled that kind of emotional energy into.

Potter grabbed his glasses, practically jumping off the couch and scurrying out of the living room and into Draco’s kitchen. Draco tried hard not to think about that, either—about how comfortable Potter was in his flat, or the way Potter moved around Draco’s space as if it were his own. 

“Where is it?” Potter hollered over the sound of cupboards being manically open and shut.

“In the cupboard with the tea,” Draco yelled back.

A pause. “Your tea or my tea?” 

Draco swallowed down the flutter in his throat. He’d lied and told Potter the PG Tips had ‘accidentally’ made it into his trolley last week, but apparently Potter had seen past his lie.

“It's in the cupboard with the pitiful excuse for tea you drink,” Draco answered.

Potter’s derisive laughter echoed through the open doorway.

“Aha, found it,” Potter crowed triumphantly a few seconds later. “Holy shit, this is the mother lode. You were holding out on me, Malfoy!”

“It was on special,” Draco shouted, unsure why he felt the need to lie. 

“Oh fuck yes, you bought Party Rings.” Draco didn’t need to see Potter to know he was smiling.

“Entirely accidental, I assure you,” Draco replied, loud enough for Potter to hear. He wondered if there was enough plausible deniability for him to pretend he didn’t know those were Potter’s favourite biscuits. 

Potter didn’t immediately return to the living room. Instead, Draco heard the familiar sound of more cupboards being opened and shut before he recognised the sound of the kettle. It was a strange feeling to know someone else was comfortable in the home Draco had made for himself. It was nice—an intimate familiarity that he hadn’t known he’d been missing. Having Potter in his home reminded him of late nights at Hogwarts sharing packets of sweets with Potter when neither of them could sleep, or Sunday mornings when they’d take breakfast together before the rest of the school was awake because he and Potter had already been up and flying for hours. There was an intimate familiarity to it that spoke of something deeper, more complicated. Something that, for once, Draco didn’t quite have the words to articulate. 

Unlike Hogwarts, this was not temporary. Potter wasn’t sitting with him because they were the only two awake nor were they bonding at midnight over the terrors of their past because there was no one else. He was there because he wanted to be.

“Sickle for your thoughts,” Potter said minutes later, strolling back into the living room with a tray in his hands. Potter’s abhorrent milky tea was sitting there in a mug Draco was absolutely certain he’d never seen before, alongside the entire package of Party Rings. But beside the steaming mug of very wrongly made tea was something else. Something for Draco.

Draco tried not to let his pleasure betray him as Potter set it down on the coffee table in front of them. Draco’s preferred green-and-gold bone china tea cup sat atop the matching saucer, the teapot steaming and a small bowl of sugar and the strainer for the teabags sat next to it.

Potter had made Draco’s tea.

Potter had made Draco his tea. In the teacup Draco liked with just the right amount of sugar on the side ready to be added in last, as it should be. Not the easy and tasteless tea bags that he for some reason prefered but the loose-leaf kind Draco kept in a separate cabinet away from the foods that were very obviously for Potter even if Draco wouldn’t admit it.

There was a strange whirring noise in Draco’s ears and he was glad he was already sitting down, lest he suffer the embarrassment of fainting in front of Potter.

“Seriously, you alright?” Potter asked, shoving an entire pink Party Ring into his mouth (despite the fact that it was not a fun size version) as he set about pouring Draco’s tea.

“I’m fine, just a bit of a headache coming on, is all,” Draco said, and it wasn’t far from the truth. His head felt close to splitting, though likely not for any of the reasons Potter might be imagining as he winced in sympathy.

“You work too much,” Potter said, adding exactly two spoonfuls of sugar to Draco’s tea. 

The throbbing in Draco’s head moved to his heart, beating so rapidly it was hard to breathe. 

“We should go flying this weekend. Let off some steam. It would be fun.”

“I haven’t been flying since we left Hogwarts,” Draco answered, accepting the tea from Potter and cradling it in his cupped hands. Though the steam was billowing towards his face, he barely felt the cup’s warmth. He was too focused on the way Potter’s eyelashes fluttered against the swell of his cheekbones when he blinked and on the soft rise and fall of his chest. Oh no. This was bad. This was very bad.

“So what? It’s not like you could’ve forgotten. You weren’t half bad, you know,” Potter joked, blissfully unaware of Draco’s mounting panic. He winked at Draco before grabbing a stack of biscuits and his tea, then scooted back into the corner, knees drawn up to his chest, tea balanced on one knee and biscuits on the other. He looked incredibly pleased with his current situation. His socked toes wiggled against the sofa as he grinned at Draco and popped his third biscuit into his mouth.

That was not cute. Draco absolutely refused to find Potter’s disastrous posture and inability to sit still and addiction to sugar and mismatched socks cute. He wouldn’t. Draco just needed a few days to gather his wits about him. He had been spending most of his free time with Potter lately, it was obviously addling his brain if he was beginning to entertain the idea of what those brightly coloured biscuit crumbs might taste like if Draco kissed him.

“I might have too much work to do,” Draco blurted out, desperate for an excuse. It was a paltry one at best and Potter seemed to see right through it as his eyes flashed with disappointment. He rid himself of his disappointment swiftly enough, though, dunking one of the blue-coated biscuits into his tea before pushing it between his open lips, licking the tea from his fingers.

“S’alright, you would’ve lost anyway.”

Draco very nearly spilt his tea. “Excuse me?”

Potter lifted his eyes to Draco. “You heard me. You’d lose.”

“Obviously you incurred some brain damage while you were gone if you think you’d beat me,” Draco said, his pride overriding his panic.

Potter chewed on the inside of his cheek, lifting his tea to take a slow sip before speaking. “I suppose you’ll just have to fly against me and find out then, won’t you?”

“I suppose I will,” Draco answered. This was fine. Everything was going to be fine.

Potter looked pleased, drinking more of his tea and waggling his eyebrows at Draco, who finally lifted up his own tea to take a drink.

It was strong and sweet and exactly how Draco liked it.

It was _perfect._

Potter had made his tea perfectly. Potter knew how he liked his tea.

Everything was not going to be fine.

 

****

***~*~*~***

Somehow Draco managed to survive the forty-one excruciatingly long hours preceding his flying engagement with Potter. He was definitely not looking forward to it. He was also—in equal measure—definitely not dreading it. Or circling the date in bright green on his calendar. It was a feat that, as far as Draco was concerned, was a bloody miracle. Not that he was nervous about seeing Potter again after what Draco had dubbed ‘the tea incident’, which was not really an _incident_ because that would give it more emotional weight than Draco was comfortable assigning it. Draco’s poor sleeping and upset digestion were cleary flukes, because he was not nervous.

At least not about flying.

“You’re gripping the broom too tight,” Potter told him. He was standing beside Draco with his arm held aloft to block the bright light of daybreak, squinting at Draco in a way that made his nose wrinkle up and his teeth show too much, highlighting the small gap between his two front teeth. The wind, which had picked up considerably in the last few minutes, had ruffled his hair so that it was even messier than usual. It shouldn’t have made it harder for Draco to breathe, and yet there he was, apparently attracted to the human equivalent of an oversized Puffskein.

“I’ve been flying longer than you’ve been alive, I know how to grip a broom, Potter,” he shot back, but he loosened his grip all the same. If Potter noticed, he had the tact not mention it as he laughed and held his hands up in surrender. He took several steps backward towards his own broom lying in the tall grass, eyes never leaving Draco’s.

“You sure you’re ready for this?” Potter asked, dipping his hand into the front pocket of his oversized hoodie. He pulled out a glittering gold Snitch—the wings beating frantically against his curled fingers.

Draco recalled the last time Potter had said those words to him, during their final Quidditch match weeks before they’d left Hogwarts. Potter’s face had been the same, Draco had been as ready then as he was now—which was to say, not in the least.

“I’m prepared for anything and everything you’ve got, Potter,” Draco lied, like a fucking liar. 

“Brilliant,” Potter breathed, holding out his right hand. The broom flew into his downturned palm without a word before he mounted it, rising into the air with an easy grace that even some professional Quidditch players lacked. 

Draco was struck, not for the first time, at what a natural flyer Potter was—his ease and grace in the air nearly unmatched. He recalled a time when that acknowledgement had filled him with a jealousy and bitterness so sour and insidious it’d ruined even his own enjoyment of flying. Now, it filled him with a warmth not even the early morning chill could steal away.

“Still don’t know why we had to fly so bloody early,” Draco grumbled, wishing he’d had the forethought to cast a warming charm before they’d come out here.

“The air is better for flying,” Potter answered with a shrug, as unbothered by the cold as ever. 

It was the exact same thing he used to say at Hogwarts, and though Draco was as much of the opinion now as he had been then that the air quality had an unchangeable baseline which the time of day couldn’t alter, he didn’t say as much out loud. The air might have seemed the same at the break of dawn, but Potter wasn’t. There’d always been something lighter about him in the early morning hours, when the whisper of a new day had been on the horizon—something free and untethered—as if the weight of the wizarding world’s expectations were still slumbering and he were free to be just Harry.

_Harry._

Draco swallowed down the rush of emotions that single name evoked. Harry at eleven, with knobby knees and a defiant smile. Harry at seventeen, boneless in Hagrid’s arms—an overwhelming sense of loss. Harry at eighteen, very much alive in body but broken in spirit. Harry at twenty, somehow more stubborn than before, knees just as knobby. His eyes alight with a kind of hope Draco hadn’t thought either of them would ever reclaim.

Harry, with the haunted eyes but bright smile. Harry with laughter louder than his pain and a heart somehow bigger than his grief. Harry, who ate biscuits on Draco’s sofa and snuck abhorrent Gryffindor mugs into his cupboards when he wasn’t looking. Harry, who was smiling at him as if there were nowhere else he’d rather be on a Sunday morning then freezing his arse off in an abandoned field with his erstwhile nemesis.

Harry. His best friend, Harry.

Draco staggered, buoyed by the broom beneath him and somehow rising into the air instead of crashing to the ground.

“Come on, Malfoy,” Potter laughed, turning his broom to face Draco. “Last one to the Snitch buys lunch.”

Potter lifted his hand into the air, Snitch held aloft as he grinned at Draco. His excitement was palpable and it was impossible for Draco not to smile back at him, despite the tremors in his heart. Not once in his life had someone else’s happiness brought him so much joy.

“Ready?” Potter asked, uncurling two fingers. The wings fluttered frantically.

“I’m ready,” Draco whispered.

Potter’s eyes darted after the tiny gold ball as it disappeared into the clouds, but Draco’s eyes remained on Potter for long seconds. At least until Potter let out a whoop and leaned forward, his broom speeding away. Not to be outdone, Draco adjusted his loosening grip on his broom and rose higher and higher until the spot of grass his boots had smashed down not moments before was but a memory.

Draco could do this. It might have been longer than he wanted to admit since he’d been on a broomstick, but he’d always been good at flying, even better at playing Quidditch. He liked having a goal, liked having something to focus on. In school, Potter had bested him more times than he ever liked to admit, both because he was that aggravatingly talented, and because Draco’s focus had often drifted from the Snitch to Potter. 

Granted, Draco still wanted to look at Potter, but for entirely different reasons. Though, reasons that were possibly as terrifying. 

Draco shook his head to clear it. Though he was vaguely aware of Potter in his periphery, now was not the time to focus on the way Potter’s arse looked bent over his broom or whether Potter was going to beat him. The Snitch. The Snitch was all that mattered. At least for now.

Everything else could wait. Everything else was a problem for later Draco.

Now Draco had a Snitch to catch. 

He was surprised at how easily the thoughts slipped away, funneling out of his mind like the sand in the ornate sand timer his father had once kept on his desk. Before. Before things changed. Draco used to sneak in while his father was working and try to make a game of flipping it to see if he could make his father laugh before the time ran out.

Time had always run out.

This time, though, Draco didn’t feel as if he were racing against the end of something. It felt like racing towards something, even if that something was unquantifiable.

It was surprising for Draco, how easily he fell back into the rhythm of the chase. 

Occasionally, he would see Potter out of the corner of his eyes squinting directly at the sun, or showing off with a dangerous move when he caught Draco watching him, but mostly it was quiet. Draco became acutely aware of the the way the breeze whipped against his cheeks and of the sounds of the birds chirping in the trees below. 

Draco’s arse was sore, his fingers ached from where he repeatedly gripped the broom too tightly, but his heart—that felt good. 

Somewhere along the lines, between doing what he had to do to survive and what he thought he was supposed to do to grow up, he’d let himself forget how much he loved flying. He’d forgotten just how much he loved competing against someone. In the midst of his grief, flying became a thing that didn’t serve a purpose for him outside of school, it offered him no moral or social stepping stones, and it wasn’t a hobby he could monetise; he’d buried his love for the game. And love the game he did. Draco loved being in the air, loved knowing he was responsible for himself and himself alone. Seeker’s games especially were perfectly tailored to Draco. He had never been good at playing on a team, but this—competing against Potter one on one as equals—this was exhilarating.

A laugh bubbled, unbidden, out of Draco’s chest.

This was fun. Fuck, this was fun.

Duty. Honor. Expectation. _Survival._

He’d spent so long figuring out to survive, he’d stopped thinking about the reasons he wanted to survive in the first place. He’d forgotten how to live.

A glimmer of gold caught Draco’s attention fifty or so feet below. He didn’t bother sparing a glance to see if Potter had noticed, or if Potter was chasing the Snitch as well. Somehow it didn’t matter. Win or lose, Draco knew what he was chasing now.

Angling his body forward, he laid flat and urged his broom onward. Farther. Faster. Dimly, he became aware of Potter hot on his tail, but he didn’t pause to check his distance or to compare their speeds. Instead, he stretched his arm out as he neared the Snitch and nearly fell off his broom in shock when his fingers closed around the fluttering wings.

He’d caught the Snitch.

He’d beat Potter.

He’d done the one thing he’d spent half his life hoping to do.

“That was fucking brilliant,” Potter crowed, slamming into him as they neared the ground and sending them both tumbling into the grass. They were only a few feet off the ground, so it didn’t hurt in the least, but Draco was left breathless by surprise just the same.

“What?” Draco choked out when he found his voice. He was splayed in the grass and blinking up at Potter, who was grabbing and shaking Draco’s hand that was still wrapped tightly around the Snitch.

Potter’s hair looked like he’d been on the wrong end of Levicorpus, his cheeks chapped red from the wind, and his expression almost wild. Draco had spent years imagining how Potter would react to losing to Draco—what the bitterness or disappointment might look like painted across Potter’s face.

Not in a million years would Draco have thought that what he might see instead was happiness.

“Brilliant,” Potter repeated. “That dive was incredible. I couldn’t even catch up to you. You were going too fucking fast.”

“You’re happy,” Draco repeated, wondering if were in shock. “Happy I beat you.”

“I mean, I’m not happy I lost but,” he answered, puffing up his cheeks with air before blowing out slowly. “The Weasleys mean well but they always let me win, at least since I came back. Even Ginny and Ron. I think they’re afraid of doing anything that might make me sad. Something that might make me leave again. But you, you flew like I was nothing special. It was incredible.”

“So you’re happy I didn’t care about your feelings?” Draco corrected, not at all less confused.

“No, you insufferable wanker,” he laughed. “I’m happy you flew like I was your equal. Like you weren’t afraid I’d break. And mostly, I was happy to see you fly again. Back at Hogwarts you always said you were happiest up in the air. I was surprised you took a job at the Ministry instead of flying professionally, to be honest. It was nice to see you happy.”

Draco sat up so fast his head spun. Potter was happy because Draco was happy.

“Potter,” Draco blurted, “I need to tell you something.”

“Let me guess, you’re not a natural blond?” Potter’s smile widened, the corners of his eyes crinkling in a way that made Draco’s chest ache. 

“What? No. Of course I’m a natural blond, you absolute bellend.”

He didn’t stop to let himself think, to gauge the pros and cons of what he was about to say or analyse the wisdom of his pending confession.

“I know this might come as a bit of a surprise. A lot of surprise really,” he started, his eyes intently focused on the adorable tilt of Potter’s head and the way he pursed his lips while focusing, “and I’ll understand if you need time to process. Just don’t hate me okay?”

Potter blinked twice, worry lines maring his forehead. 

“Just spit it out. You’re freaking me out, Malfoy.”

Draco inhaled slowly, gathering his courage and screwing his eyes shut before opening his mouth. “I fancy you.”

The world did not end upon his confession, though Draco’s stomach seemed to think perhaps it had with the way it was flipping uncomfortably. He waited for the onslaught of Potter’s shock, but none came. In fact Potter was unnaturally silent and Draco allowed his eyes to open slowly, terrified for what he might see on the other man’s face. 

Potter appeared to be mulling his words over, chewing on the inside of his cheek for long seconds before he spoke. “I’m confused.”

Draco exhaled. Confusion was better than being horrified. “I understand. I was confused at first too. You’re basically a human disaster and you eat me out of house and home and your hair makes me want to scream. Trust me, no one was more confused than me at first.”

“Wow you sure know how to sweet talk a guy,” Potter deadpanned before his lips thinned into what looked remarkably like repressed laughter. “But I’m not confused about that.”

This time it was Draco’s turn to be confused.

“Well what in Merlin’s name are you confused about?”

“Well,” Potter said softly, inching closer to Draco until his knees were pressed against Draco’s thigh. “I wasn’t aware your feelings for me were supposed to be a secret.”

“I beg your pardon?” Draco all but shrieked.

“I mean, I have eyes, Malfoy.”

“What exactly is that supposed to mean?” Draco asked, perhaps a bit more defensively than he meant to. 

“It means I see you. I see you,” Potter whispered again, reaching out to unwrap Draco’s fingers from the snitch. Draco held his breath, watching the way Potter’s fingers looked bracketing his own. The small ball hovered above their upturned palms before soaring away into the sky. “You hate Party Rings and PG Tips, but they’re always in your cupboard. You changed your schedule last week so you could go to the opening of the new toy store in Birmingham with me. And you didn’t just happened to find a maroon scarf in your wardrobe last week that you didn’t need. It was the same one you saw me eyeing through the window display in Diagon Alley last month. Malfoy, you’re really sweet.”

“ _Sweet_ ,” Draco gasped. “Slander. This is slander. No, this is character assassination. I’ve never been called something so insulting in my entire life. I don’t care how in love with you I am, I won’t stand for this.”

At that, Potter’s eyes did widen. Oh, well, buggering fuck. Kneazle out of the bag apparently.

“How you what?” Potter choked out.

“Glad to see you don’t know everything,” Draco uttered, refusing to blush. Potter hadn’t turned him down. _Yet_. But he hadn’t said he felt the same, either. Draco had never felt more terrified in all his life, but there was no going back now. Not even if he wished there were, which he didn't. It felt good to say his truths. “I, er, I love you.”

Potter continued to gape at him, but his hand still held Draco’s, which he very much hoped was a good sign.

“Potter, say something.”

“I don’t know what to say,” Potter breathed, and Draco’s stomach plummeted. _Oh._

“That’s alright, I don’t—”

“No,” Potter interrupted, “ _no_. That’s not—fuck, I’m not good at words.”

Potter pulled his hand out of Draco’s to run it through his hair and Draco closed his eyes to prepare for the incoming heartbreak. He was not prepared for calloused fingers to caress his cheeks. He opened his eyes to find Potter watching him with a look so undeniably fond it left him breathless. 

“I don’t know how to say it back. I don’t...I’ve never said it before. To anyone. Ever. But if...if I ever felt that way about someone, it’s you,” he whispered.

“Oh,” Draco breathed, heart settling somewhere closer to his chest than his throat. This didn’t sound anything like rejection. “You don’t have to say it back.”

“I will. I will one day. I promise,” Potter said, with the kind of conviction that left Draco with no doubts. “But for now, let me show you. Please.”

Draco nodded, acutely aware of the warmth of Potter’s hands and the way his thumbs slid against the arch of his cheekbone. Tentatively, Potter leaned in. The kiss was barely a brush of lips, more a promise than anything else. Potter’s lips were chapped and chilled from the wind and Draco had never wanted to touch or be touched the way he did in that moment. Potter was so viscerally alive and flawed and beautiful, and Draco loved him. Merlin but Draco loved him.

When Potter pulled back there was a smile so genuine and pure on his face Draco felt it in his bones, felt a responding smile spread across his own face.

Draco reached out to tangle his fingers in Potter’s hair, pulling him closer and into another kiss. This one wasn’t hesitant or questioning, but burning with the intensity of matched desires.

It was a Sunday the day Draco knew he was loved

**Author's Note:**

> Come find me on [Tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/goldentruth813) <3


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